By Guy Page

The Vermont House Tuesday morning gave preliminary approval to H.545, the vaccine bill rejecting the federal vaccine guidelines proposed by AHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy. It also voted against the bill’s proposed [Rep. Greg of Cabot] Burtt amendment, requiring more parental information about child vaccination.

The amendment had been rejected earlier in the House Human Services Committee that morning.

These Republicans and a few independents, Progressive Brian Cina, and Democrat Dave Yacovone of Morristown) voted to approve the Burtt amendment, which failed 47-90 (12 absent) on the House floor:

The House also gave preliminary approval to H. 635, eliminating Department of Corrections supervisory fees. The bill would eliminate supervisory fees charged by the state’s corrections system and forgive all unpaid balances.

Under the measure, the Vermont Department of Corrections would no longer assess, bill or collect supervisory fees from people on probation, parole, furlough or other forms of supervision. The department would also be barred from using collection agencies or other outside entities to pursue those fees.

The bill requires the department to forgive all outstanding supervisory fee balances and remove references to them from its records and its online payment portal. It also directs the agency to stop all current collection efforts, including wage garnishment or tax refund offsets, and to coordinate with other agencies involved in collecting the debt to halt those actions.

Additionally, the measure clarifies that failure to pay a supervisory fee could not be considered a violation of probation, parole, furlough or any other criminal sentence.

Also on Tuesday, the Vermont Senate:

• passed S.243, $150,000 funding for the Vermont Language Justice Project. The bill, sponsored by Sen. Martine Gulick (D-Chittenden) requires the Department of Health to distribute funds to the Vermont Language Justice Project for the creation of informational materials related to a disease outbreak or other public health emergency.”
• gave preliminary approval to H. 649. The captive insurance companies bill. Vermont is home to a robust captive insurance industry, and annually approves legislation to support this industry, in which large companies have ‘captive’ companies providing their insurance.